In general, a monitoring camera is an apparatus which photographs a predetermined monitoring area by a solid-state element such as a CCD, transmits an obtained image signal to a monitoring center, and displays the image signal on a monitor screen or records and stores it on a hard disk recorder or the like to monitor an intruder. When monitoring, naturally, the image sensing range of the monitoring camera is adjusted to a predetermined monitoring area that needs monitoring, and the monitoring camera is set on the ceiling, wall, floor, or the like to monitor.
Particularly, in recent years, as the significance of security increases, the use of the monitoring camera is becoming popular in offices, stores, parking lots, outdoors, and furthermore houses. In this situation, the monitoring camera can be installed at any location whether indoors or outdoors, as described above, and must have such a shape that it can be installed at any location.
In other words, the monitoring camera requires an attaching portion that copes with installation at any location. Because of the nature of the monitoring camera, when it is installed outdoors, its attaching portion and furthermore the main body itself must have a high strength and durability against an external destructive attack. When the monitoring camera is installed outdoors, heat that is generated upon irradiation with the solar heat and by internal electronic circuit components and increases the temperature must be dissipated efficiently.
For example, according to the first prior art, when hanging a rectangular parallelepiped monitoring camera from the ceiling, the tripod attaching portion for the main body is attached to the upper surface portion of the main body with a screw. When the tripod attaching portion is to be attached to a tripod or the like from below, some monitoring camera can be set in two ways. Namely, the tripod attaching portion can be removed and attached again to the lower surface portion of the main body with a screw so that the monitoring camera can be hung. Alternatively, the tripod can be attached directly from the lower portion (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 5-207340). According to another example, the tripod screw portion is shifted in accordance with where and how the tripod is to be attached, as in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 8-102880.
According to the second prior art, tripod screw portions are directly formed on the upper and lower surface portions of the casing of the rectangular parallelepiped camera main body (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 5-207340). According to the third prior art, the tripod attaching portion is provided to only one portion of the upper or lower surface, and a CCD image is output from either the upper or lower portion in accordance with how the tripod is attached. According to the fourth prior art, the third prior art is modified so that the CCD image is output from a portion which is electrically opposite to where, either the upper or lower portion, the tripod is attached.
Regarding heat dissipation, according to the fifth prior art, the chassis is made by using aluminum die cast, magnesium die cast, or the like to dissipate heat from the casing. This increases the strength of the main body of the casing chassis as well. Furthermore, according to the sixth prior art, a fan is set in the monitoring camera main body.
In the first prior art described above, the tripod attaching portion is fixed to the main body with a screw, and is removed and attached again in accordance with how the camera is to be installed. Therefore, when the strength of the tripod attaching portion is to be increased, the structure of the tripod attaching portion inevitably becomes large, and accordingly the main body itself becomes bulky. As in the second prior art, when the tripod attaching portions are formed on the upper and lower portions of the main body casing, the loads acting on the tripod attaching portions are undesirably, directly transmitted to the casing main body. Thus, a load caused by external destruction is undesirably, directly transmitted to the casing.
In the third prior art, once the monitoring camera is set, it cannot be removed and attached in an opposite direction. For example, once the monitoring camera is attached as a type that hangs from the ceiling, it cannot be removed and attached to a floor stand afterwards. In the fourth prior art, the image must be inverted upside down when how the monitoring camera is attached is changed. The electronic circuits and the like accordingly become complicated to increase the cost.
In the fifth prior art, since die cast of aluminum, magnesium, or the like is used to form the casing, the cost of the casing increases largely. As in the sixth prior art, if a cooling fan is provided in the camera, the main body becomes bulky, and the cost increases. Also, the noise from the fan poses limitation on the location to make it difficult to install the monitoring camera at a quite place.
As described above, according to the prior art, the design is limited due to the structure and strength of the main body of the monitoring camera, and the main body becomes bulky. Also, the number of electronic circuits increases, the cost increases, and the noise is produced.